


permanent option

by Blownwish



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Cheating, Everyone cheats, Fingering, Frottage, Hand Jobs, Marital Breakdown, Multi, Pliroy, peripheral jjbella, peripheral otayuri
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-22
Updated: 2017-11-22
Packaged: 2019-02-05 06:55:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12789222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blownwish/pseuds/Blownwish
Summary: Yuri Plisetsky is his Permanent Option, but only because JJ pretends he will always say yes.





	permanent option

**Author's Note:**

> Live beta’d by [Annabeth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/annabeth/pseuds/annabeth). She deserves a medal for putting up with me.
> 
> Sorry this is kinda trash.

Jean-Jacques discovered the concept of the Permanent Option a month after he retired with two Olympic Gold medals, when he broke his ankle walking to his Uber in Le Robin’s parking lot. Okay, so he might’ve been a little tipsy. He liked wine just fine, but that night, sitting on that leather barstool watching Robbie scrub out the shot glasses, JJ realized he could have beer, now. And, okay, so JJ also thought four pints of Molson wasn’t going to be all that, well, influential over his nervous system. With the calmest crying possible, he told the Uber driver there was a change in their itinerary. 

“Cover your mouth.” He propped his foot up on the bench seat with his seatbelt strangling him. “It’s contagious. The pandemic can be stopped if we all do our part.”

 

And it was then, as the Uber driver pedaled her cute little Honda Civic to Hospital Hôtel Dieu, as Jean-Jacques lost count of the lights between that last good stride on his right ankle and months of recovery, as he imagined his calendar slotted with follow ups and physical therapy, he realized there was no way he could change his mind and compete next season. Skating wasn’t an option anymore. “This means something.” 

“You’re a little drunk, buddy.”

Jean-Jacques would be pacing but he’s wearing a boot for his ankle. He’s explaining what this means to his iPhone, where Otabek’s voice wafts through the air and over a glass of Mondavi cabsab. “I’m not drunk. It’s just one glass. Besides, I’m European. This is what we do.” 

“Canadians are European, now. Good to know.”

“Yes. That is correct. And I appreciate how you keep the patronizing tone when you’re being sarcastic. You always go the extra mile.” Jean-Jacques finishes his glass. And it was just a half glass, really. He should have a little more. “What do you think of my idea?”

“Only you could romanticize indecision.”

“But it’s true! That moment before you decide makes you feel so free. And why?” He overpours, but it’s not the end of the world. “Because your options are so open.”

“Why do I pick up your calls?”

Jean-Jacques squints into the glass and it reminds him of blood. “Must be my charm.”

“I have to hit the rink. Put the bottle away before you get hurt again.”

“Peace.” He nearly spills his glass when he makes the timeout signal. 

Otabek isn’t done. “Actually I was going to contact you about something.”

JJ sighs. He doesn’t know what’s more important than ideas. Ideas make art and rocket ships. Ideas are potent. Ideas about ideas make JJ’s head spin. “But what do you think of my idea?”

“I’m going to ask Yuri to move to Almaty before the season starts.” He says it all at once, as if he has to get it over with quickly. 

JJ shrugs. “You… _want permission?_ Hey - enjoy this. I remember when I was thinking about asking Izzy to marry me. Never so in love in my life. It was amazing.” The wine tastes so good. 

“Right. Well, thanks for the support.”

“Why do you want him to move in? You know living with someone is not the same as dating. Or sleeping over.” 

“I said I’m thinking about it.” Otabek says something in Russian. He’s probably cursing. JJ used to imagine Otabek was saying rude things about his mother. Now he pictures Otabek muttering a long, low string of it in a chant that floated into the atmosphere, then rained down over JJ, tripping him over the curb and breaking his ankle. “Just wanted to let you know.”

“Jeez, you really think I have a problem with that, don’t you?” He touches his fingers to his temple. He never says that name without some sort of reverence. “Oh, I get it. You’re warning me off. Let me guess: Yuri wants something permanent and he’s been dropping hints.”

“Given the circumstances I just wanted to make sure you understood. Yuri isn’t going to want you anymore.”

“Hey, I’m still married, Beks.” He nearly stands up. He nearly stands up to walk toward the window. But the boot — JJ smiles. “I wasn’t planning on asking anyone to move in with me. You want a relationship? Then give’r. All I was saying was enjoy the moment before you tell him. Enjoy the _right now_.”

“There is no further point in talking to you.”

“So when are you —?“ JJ stops when the phone call ends. He knows why Otabek doesn’t want to talk about the future. It’s better not to. “To Yuri Plisetsky.” He holds up his bottle to the sunset in a window he could get up to watch. Maybe he will. He puts his glass to his lips. 

++

JJ didn’t have a name for the Permanent Option when he met Yuri Plisetsky in Toronto, just a notion of what it meant when JJ gave in to the temptation of wrestling him to the ground when all five feet and change of him tried to tackle him over one little wolf whistle. He had to; the kid was seriously trying to gouge JJ’s eyes out. And, call it serendipity, credit Yuri for choosing a deserted corner of the rink to jump JJ, call it a test from God, but no one was there to witness JJ straddling Yuri’s torso as JJ slammed his hands over his head. 

“One hell of a kerfuffle over a whistle, kitty cat.” 

His eyes were the greenest eyes JJ ever saw. His lips weren’t soft. They were chapped. But they were bright pink, like fruit. Edible fruit. And his body was so small. “Do it.” 

JJ leaned down. He wasn’t going to do anything. Plisetsky was cute but he was a kid and JJ wasn’t going to cheat on Isabella. But he wasn’t going to tell that to Plisetsky, no. He was going to give the kid a scare for trying to murder him with _knife shoes_. 

Knife shoes?

JJ got close. Real close. Close enough to drown out the buzzing halogen lights until Yuri was staring up at a shadow. “What do you think I’m going to do to you, kitty?”

He wasn’t expecting Yuri Plisetsky to close the space between them. He wasn’t expecting him to press those rough, chapped lips against his. Fast. 

Of course they pulled away from each other the second they heard footsteps around the corner. And of course that wasn’t the only time. That was just the introduction to the Permanent Option that was Yuri Plisetsky. And, of course, JJ only thought of the situation as _Yuri Plisetsky_. 

Yuri Plisetsky presented himself, again, in Moscow. He hissed and he cursed whenever he was near JJ, making him near irresistible when he leaned up against another lonely wall, in another empty corner of JJ’s head, trying to shove JJ when he passed. “Hey.”

JJ stopped. “Need something?”

Yuri stepped in front of him. Yuri, in that cute little Russian tracksuit, sized him up. Then Yuri tried to shove him again. 

JJ laughed as he backed Yuri up against the wall. “You wanna kiss me again?”

“You going to make me?” Yuri was pink, and JJ would’ve bet his hand would burn if he touched his cheek. And that moment turned around them as JJ tilted his head and Yuri glared up at him and an infinite number of possibilities bloomed, like flowers, ready to be picked. JJ almost touched those lips again, this time with his fingertip. Almost. 

JJ let him go. 

Then there was Barcelona, when JJ nearly lost it all over a Permanent Option named Yuri Plisetsky. 

_leave him alone_

Otabek had a new number but the same attitude when it came to his precious teenage obsession. And Isabella needed a ring. And, incidentally, all the gold medals. JJ tried to jump, tried to fly. But he wasn’t a bird. He was a man who imagined he had wings to break. 

JJ got the medal and the girl. Otabek got the Permanent Option named Yuri Plisetsky. _We’re friends_. Yuri preened like a cat as he combed his hair away from his face. As he sat next to JJ at the press table. As he spoke to the flashing lights and sneered into millions of online hits. _I can have friends._ As Yuri’s hand kneaded JJ’s thigh under the table. 

Yuri had love bites all over his neck. So did Otabek. JJ could see them as Otabek stood against the wall, like the man at the end of the line, like the boogie man, as he lifted his neck and let JJ take a good, long look. 

Too bad for Otabek — Yuri never changed his relationship status on Instagram and waited for JJ in another empty hallway. This time it was in Helsinki, but these hallways were all in that same little corner of JJ’s mind. “What do you want, Jeh Jeh?” He heard Yuri’s voice behind him, like a question JJ forgot to ask.

“I don’t know.” He said it quickly, only knowing he didn’t want to walk away yet. 

Yuri shoved him. “Yes, you do.” 

This time Otabek wasn’t there. He wasn’t there to stop JJ from grabbing Yuri’s hand when he tried to slap his face. He wasn’t there to stop him when he pulled that naughty kitty up against him. And Otabek couldn't stop JJ when he lowered his head and whispered, “I’m not telling you,” right before he reached down and put his hands down Yuri Plisetsky’s tracksuit. “I’m keeping all options open.”

Yuri Plisetsky gasped and it made JJ feel free. Yuri didn’t want JJ to win gold and he didn’t want to have JJ’s babies and he didn’t have one singular plan for JJ’s life. In fact Yuri Plisetsky, with his small, tight ass and his kitty cat sexy, could have blown it all to smithereens. 

He was irresistible. 

++

The boot is a pain in the ass. He can’t wrestle with little Alain and he can’t play horsie with Annette. He can’t even drive them anywhere. He’s got an Uber prescription to match the Percocet one. JJ just sits, slightly stoned, as Juliette Yang smiles back at him as his children swarm her. “Bad break?”

“Fracture.” He knocks on the blue boot. “Stepped funny on a curb. Darndest thing, eh?”

She won’t be able to put them down because they are made of invisible Velcro. They cling with a strength that is not in their chubby arms and legs and she laughs and her fine grey bob is only a little ruffled. “Go to your Papa.” 

They only fall all over his boot. She laughs even harder. It’s okay, they can’t hurt him any more than he managed to hurt himself. He just screwed himself out of being able to skate. He might as well be in a wheelchair. 

His mother-in-law is a real peach. “Where’s Izzy?”

“Where are _you?_ ” She keeps smiling. “You’re not here anymore?” Juliette knows this because she lives in this, his house, now. 

“Maman, please.” Mercifully, Isabella scoops Annette up and Alain follows out of jealousy. One day he’s going to start performing for her attention. JJ is as sure of this as he sure of his own name. He’s already jumping up and down. JJ pats a spot next to the sofa and his son sits next to him, even though he clearly wants to be with his mama. “Ah, if you could take the kids outside to the sandbox?"

Juliette leaves. Not a word, not a flaw in her smile, and she went through the sliding glass door with two little squealing Leroys. 

JJ says, “Please don’t smoke.”

“Okay,” Izzy whispers, “that’s where she smokes. Sorry babe.”

That is not good and he will get to that. “You need more money?” This is his family. 

“You’re more than generous. It’s okay.” She’s wearing that pretty pink kimono. She looks soft scrubbed and fresh. Clean.

She just took a shower. “Let me know if you do.” He searches her eyes as she smiles. “You doing okay, Iz?”

“Yeah.” She sighs. “Maman says hardship is what marriage is for. That’s her way of saying she needs a day off. Isn’t she the best?”

“I can come back any time. You say the word. I’ll be back before you finish saying it.” He has to say this, and he would do these things. “And Juliette is right.” 

“I have two kids, not three, Jay. I can’t ride a nonstop rollercoaster.” She watches her mother puff at a Marlboro Light. “You seeing Yuri Plisetsky?”

“No.” If he could, he would. _Crisse!_ He keeps thinking about all the sharp jabs Yuri would have for him if he saw JJ like this. And he would keep pushing him to move, get up out of his chair and fuck, get out of the apartment to buy Yuri some damn clothes, drink, argue, then fuck it out until Yuri was exploding like champagne all over JJ. 

Not here - he can’t think about _him, here_. JJ focuses back on his children. 

He wants to get up and tap the window. He would wave at the kids but it would be for the sole purpose of making that cigarette go away. But he can’t. And she won’t. “I’m not seeing anyone in particular.” He looks at the sliding glass door, then back at her. “Otabek mentioned something about asking Yuri to move to Almaty. Bet Otabek ends up signing a lease in St. Petersburg.”

She gets up and taps the glass. Shakes her finger at her mother.

“Give it a week.”

She doesn’t turn around. “And if some striking Russian blond happens to have a super-secret photoshoot scheduled with you?” She smiles over her shoulder. “You know what they say. It’s not just the cheating. It’s the lying.” Her smile trembles. “I won’t be quite as angry if you’re honest.” 

She’s trying so hard not to cry. He tries to take her hand when he gets up. But she taps the glass with it again. JJ sighs. “I deserve that.”

“I’m not supposed to judge. It’s not my place.” She is looking outside, again. Little Alain is trying to keep the baby from throwing sand. Juliette is still smoking on the lawn chair. “Just be honest.” 

++

They were shopping in Paris like a couple of chicks, which was fine by JJ. He liked shopping like a chick, and he _really_ liked having a kitty to dress up, too. He didn’t like this Parisian French, though. He draws the line on certain girlie things. 

“It’s French. Who cares?” Yuri was about to try on the red wife beater JJ spent ten minutes begging him to try on. JJ nabbed the shirt Yuri threw over the door and put it to his nose so he could breathe in that warm Coco Chanel Yuri’d been wearing all weekend. JJ couldn’t wait to see the top. He had an idea. 

He wanted to take a picture of Yuri at the Seines with the wind in his hair and the sun gleaming on his creamy skin. He already had so many pictures. Not to post, but to keep because he knew it would be over by Monday morning. 

“You wanna see?”

JJ didn’t wait for him to come out. He pushed through the door once Yuri cracked it open and all he could think was _cherry pie_ when he saw how pink he was and how red his lips were when he licked them and stepped back and - oh! - he was in those red briefs JJ got him. “What have we got here, kitty?” JJ turned him around and he watched Yuri’s cheeks flush and they were warm when he touched that flush then those lips when they opened. “Shhh.” His hands trailed down the soft red cotton. “Do you like it?” 

“Yeah.”

They didn’t go to the river. The taxi took them back to the Langlois Hotel. JJ traced a slow line from Yuri’s jaw to his fingertip as Yuri stared at the scenery. “Red is your color,” said JJ. Yuri snorted. 

Their feet took them to a room and an anwar sofa where Yuri backed JJ into velvet cushions and a cocoon masquerading as an afghan. They hid under this as they kissed forever, sliding their tongues against each other, pressing their bodies against each other, touching each other, anywhere they could reach, kicking off shoes and socks and pulling down pants. 

“Jerk me off.” Yuri pulled JJ’s hand down. Pulled it under the elastic. “I wanted you to do it in the store. Do it, next time.”

Next time. 

JJ imagined next time as Yuri nuzzled his jaw. As Yuri kneaded his arm. As JJ pumped Yuri’s cock. “Chaton.” JJ imagined a time and space like this one, when he had Yuri all to himself. “I’d pull down your shorts, next time.” He does, a little. “Not all the way. Just enough.” Was that possible?

Yuri licked his neck. “Enough for what?”

JJ spit in his hand and slicked up his own dick. “What do you think?” He pressed himself against Yuri’s sweet, tight thighs, he took Yuri’s sweet, pink cock in hand, and he held Yuri down on top of him. “Enough.” 

Yuri let the blanket fall away as JJ thrusted. He let his arms fall back. He let his neck arch as his head fell back as he sobbed and came for JJ. He was heavy on top of him, but he was flexible. He twisted around and slipped down. When he was back up he had swallowed a mouth full. 

JJ groaned. “Did you really mean that?”

“Depends.” The smile on Yuri’s face disappeared. He propped himself up on JJ’s chest. “What’s in it for me, Leroy?”

“A lot of shopping, a lot of wine, a lot of sex.” He usually wanted to close his eyes and wallow in sweat and come for a minute. But at this time tomorrow he would want to give anything to be back where he was, so he kept them open, even though that made him want to close them even more. 

Yuri bent his head and his hair feathered over JJ’s chest before he kissed his skin. “But you’re staying with her. You’re not breaking up or separated or anything.”

“You’re worried I want something from you? Some kind of commitment?” He combed Yuri’s hair back and traced circles on Yuri’s temples. “Relax, kitten. The ring is still on my finger. You’re still freerange.”

And JJ could tell himself he was happy letting Yuri run free. Could tell himself he didn’t want more. He had to. Anything else was inconvenient. 

There was a crystal figurine of an angel on the coffee table. It was too easy to knock over, but its smile would still be there. “Holy shit! You never stop with the arrogance,” said Yuri. “You’re reading too much into this. I’m just trying to figure out how we are going to fuck. And get me new clothes.” He smiled. “You pay for the room and the food.”

JJ couldn’t smile back. But he could play along. “You paying for the wine?”

Why were these kinds of smiles so beautiful? Was it because they seemed so fragile? “When you’re getting this fine ass? Hell no, Leroy.” 

“Is that what it costs to make you convenient?” He wanted to close his eyes, to shut this away and wallow in Yuri’s body heat. Yuri was always so warm. So silky smooth and warm. 

“Let’s sleep in the bed. I don’t want to roll off and get attacked by that coffee table.”

JJ let Yuri pull him up and drag him to the poster bed. Throw him on the wrong side of the bed and let him plop in, close. 

Isabella had started sleeping with the baby on a futon she pulled out every night in the nursery. JJ hadn’t actually snuggled in bed since Isabella was pregnant with little Alain. Yuri threw an arm and leg over him. Pressed himself against him. Pulled up the tangled sheet and kicked, kicked, kicked until the thing covered their feet. “Don’t snore.”

“I don’t snore.”

“Yeah you snore, okay? I’ll pinch your nose this time if you do. ”

JJ closed his eyes and savored the warmth. “You talk in your sleep.” Yuri smacked his arm. He didn’t mind. 

“You’re such a bad liar.”

He didn’t miss Izzy’s arms around him. The baby needed her. But he knew he would miss this. It almost felt like Yuri was all his. 

Yuri muttered. “Glad this isn’t serious.”

++

JJ is going to reserve a bed and breakfast. His first thought is Connecticut but he’s not traveling far with this boot. 

“No. I’m going to Montreal.” Yuri is looking up, so JJ can see that Yuri is nestled, naked in a cheetah print sheet. “You’re practically single now, so who really cares?” JJ wonders what kind of phone Yuri has, now that he has to Skype instead of using FaceTime, and wonders who Yuri blames for ‘making’ him break it. 

“I’m married. I’m going to stay married. Forget the bed and breakfast. Maybe rent something over the weekend.” He’s not thrilled about how much this situation costs, but keeping a low profile is worth it. 

“I’m not bothering if I have to keep sneaking around.” Yuri tosses his hair back and tilts his head. “It’s over with her. Let it go.”

The boot makes his skin itch. The boot makes him drink too much Molson and brood over other skaters’ rink posts. The boot keeps JJ in his apartment, like a jailer. Makes him stew in his thoughts and those thoughts are too full of two things he wants. And he wants to pretend he can let Yuri live with him. It feels good, it’s the Permanent Option, where he can reel in the possibility without reality breaking JJ’s heart. 

“Let me come over and take care of you.” His voice is so soft and his eyes are so blue in that green and JJ wants to believe Yuri would actually love a washed up figure skater, love him enough to take care of him. It feels good to pretend he can turn that down. But Yuri doesn’t mean it. 

“I’m not getting a divorce. You know this.” He knows Yuri isn’t impressed with the sweatshirt so he pulls it off. He knows what Yuri likes. “I can’t take you shopping like this, anyway.”

“Yeah, you can. You just need a reason to get off your moody ass.” Yuri bites his lip and wiggles. Yeah, he’s looking at JJ’s body. Good. Yuri isn’t the only one who can play this game. “Dress me like trash and fuck me in your bed, Jeh Jeh.”

“Otabek called me last week.” JJ isn’t budging. “Are you holding out for him to move to St Petersburg?”

Yuri reaches down under the sheet. “ _You_ want to move to St Petersburg? You like my bed? I might let you see it.”

“Just might?” JJ watches Yuri’s arm flex. He’s avoiding the question, and he’s only avoiding it because Otabek isn’t moving. Someone will give in and it feels like another ankle break. 

“If you’re nice, maybe.” Yuri lets the sheet slip enough to show JJ the deep pink head of his dick. “Would you be nice to me, Jeh Jeh?”

JJ pulls down his sweatpants. He grips his cock and holds his camera up, too. “Nice to you? Kitten, I would stuff your apartment with silky pillows and fuck you on every one of them. I’d make you come with pearls around your dick, baby boy. I’d wash you down in champagne and fuck you in diamonds. I wouldn’t be nice to you, Yuri Plisetsky. I would spoil you.”

Yuri bites his lip. His eyes close and Yuri’s sheet falls away and JJ grins because he can practically hear Yuri begging him for it and - oh, yes! - he’s so pink and lush and so beautiful and — “So spoil me in Montreal, and I’ll take such good care of you.” 

JJ has to laugh. It’s at himself— because he’s so pathetic. He wants to say yes like he wants his next breath. “You know you can’t. We’ll get a nice cabin near a hospital, in case there’re any curbs.“

“No. I get what I want or forget it.” He spits in his hand and makes his dick so wet and so _edible_. “You’ll just say it’s for business. Your lame work out line or some shit, anyway.”

“Ooo! Wear my clothes in a photo shoot, baby.” JJ would take the pictures and he wouldn’t publish them in ads. No one else would get see Yuri half dressed in Canadian-red track suits, pants pulled down, shirt pulled up; JJ’s hand would be in the frame, on Yuri’s body —

“Dress me up, Jeh Jeh.”

JJ strokes his dick as Yuri rolls his hips. “I want to make red silk jockstraps with a white maple leaf on the crotch so I can pull back the elastic and snap it on your ass.” 

“Put me in the magazines. Post me on your Instagram.” He sits up and thrusts into his hand. “Show everyone.”

If JJ is smart, he won’t take the bait. He likes to think he’s smart. He tries. “You want Daddy to be proud of you?” 

Yuri groans. “Yeah.” He is about to come for JJ. “Oh, fuck! Jeh Jeh _oh, fuck!_ ” He screencaps the moment Yuri arches his back like the bow that shot St Sebastian and JJ almost comes when Yuri splatters all over his hand. 

He’s not surprised when Yuri licks it off. JJ asks, “How many times have you come today?” And who else did he come for? Oh, fuck. He has to stop thinking about that. 

“I was thinking of you when I did it.” Yuri snorts because he knows how absurd that is. For all JJ knows there’s someone in Yuri’s apartment right now. “Was I being bad?”

“Very bad.” JJ strokes himself as the light shines on Yuri’s lower lip. He imagines coating it with semen he could use to make another baby. He might still make another baby. And he might still come all over that perfect mouth and smear it into those perfect lips like gloss before he kissed that mouth. 

JJ strokes himself and Yuri lies back. “You’re gripping yourself too hard. Do it the way you do me, just your one finger and thumb, not the whole hand.” JJ brings his phone down for him. “No. I want to see your face.” JJ keeps it down there. “Asshole!”

He doesn’t want Yuri to see what JJ is afraid to show him. All those lonely nights, all the self doubt, all the crazy in his skull and the ache he’s felt wishing he could actually muster the gumption to call Yuri, to tell Yuri (what?) instead of pretending it didn’t matter. 

"How many people do you fuck, Jeh Jeh?”

No one, since his accident. He’s not sold on the idea of inviting Grindr dates to his place. “You want me to lie?” He can lie. “No one.” But he doesn’t. 

Because Yuri is the only sex he’s been having this week. JJ fills the days and nights with skate videos and pain meds and evening beer that’s been dripping into his mid-afternoons, and porn, spliced with visits from Maman and her grocery sacks and the odd call from Russia. 

_It’s only been Yuri. It’s only ever, really been Yuri. Ever since that first day._

Yuri is quiet. Maybe he’s already hung up. Maybe JJ is coming for a black screen. Or maybe he’s just muffled by the rush of blood and beer and Percocet. JJ isn’t the one to decide; he looks at the Cross mounted on his tigerlily wallpaper and he moans _don’t be gone_ as he gets one drop on his iPhone. 

“Jeh Jeh?”

Yuri has his chin propped on his hand. “Fuck your clothes and your bullshit, Leroy. I’m coming down there and taking care of you.” He can’t mean that. JJ is just fooling himself, pretending it is. He can’t. Because if he does, if Yuri Plisetsky comes to Montreal, JJ won’t be able to let him go. “Ask me.”

JJ doesn’t know what to say. No is safer. It only hurts in the moment. “Please, don’t?”

The screen goes black. 

++

JJ wasn’t a virgin before Yuri. He never slept with girls, not because he didn’t want to, but because he was afraid he’d get one pregnant. 

“Runs in the family, son.” Alain Leroy patted JJ’s back at his wedding reception. “Leroys are a potent line.” And it was true. JJ’s reception was a small moveable village, mostly named Leroy. “You’re gonna have lotsa babies in that house. Time to think about life. What you’re going to do after professional skating. How you’re going to provide for your family.”

Papa wasn’t drunk. He had twelve years sobriety. He was probably the only sober person there. Even some of the kids had a glass of champagne under the silky white tarp where a spread that cost JJ the moon sat on top of foldout tables and stained tablecloths. 

“Yes, sir.” He smiled. “Thinking about carrying on the family business. Keep gold in the family, eh?”

Alain glanced over JJ’s shoulder, where Izzy was sitting like a queen in her veil, wearing a crown of flowers. “She loves you.”

He loved her. 

He loved her as they had their first dance, barefooted on soft grass, like the first time they danced around the campfire at St Mary’s harvest festival. He loved her as she tossed her bouquet and he bundled her off in the limousine so he could finally kiss her. He loved her the next morning in Hawaii, when she stepped out in the sand in a white bikini and he stared at her belly, wondering if he already put a baby in her. And he loved her when she was sick a month later. 

“It’s not the flu, believe me.” He put his hand there, right there, and he knew his child was somewhere underneath it. He didn’t need her to pee on that stick. He knew. 

And he was right. He got her pregnant and he was over the moon. JJ lived to feed her, desperately at first because Izzy could barely manage to keep anything down. Then, Maman would grace her with ginger ale and crackers and there was the Sea Band from Pharmaprix around Izzy’s wrist. “Am I supposed to snap it every time I throw up?” she asked JJ with a wobbly smile. “I need to keep the prenatal down, at least.”

Second trimester was good because her bump was so sweet and he could feel his boy kick under his hand when JJ sang to him and Izzy could finally eat all the almond avocado salads and banana coconut milk shakes and breaded baked seitan and spinach sautés JJ prepared for the precious mother of his child and their baby. 

Third trimester was JJ’s favorite. She was glowing and ripe with her big belly and he loved pulling up her shirt just to watch his son move underneath her skin. He kissed her belly reverently. He held her gently as she cried through early labor. Drove like a madman to the hospital and stayed with her for twelve hours as she screamed and cried and then they both cried when little Alain came into the world, hungry for his mother’s nipple. 

He didn’t mind when she came home and refused to let the baby go. His son needed his mother’s milk and he needed his mother’s voice and he cried so much. Cried when she held him. Cried louder when she put him down. Maman shook her head and found a teddy bear that played white noise, like the one she used for Jean-Claude. Sometimes Izzy would sob as she held him. That was when JJ would take his boy and drive him around in the brand new Volvo and play Mozart, not too loudly, as he explained how much Mama and Papa loved their poor, colicky baby boy. 

“Give him some formula,” Maman said. “It’ll settle him down and you two can get some sleep.”

He didn’t know how to tell her he slept through the night. Or that he had no idea how many times Izzy got up with little Alain, because she slept in the nursery now. Or how many days he came home from practice to find the house a mess, and Izzy sleeping on the nursery futon with the baby. He cooked dinner every night. He ate alone as she ate on the living room sofa, nursing the baby. His mother would have offered to clean his house. Would’ve offered to watch the baby so Izzy could get out of the house. Would’ve given the baby a bottle of formula, JJ was fairly certain, since Izzy refused to pump. 

“It’s fine, Maman.” 

He didn’t push her about sex. Sex was hard for her; she was barely interested and the baby had a knack for waking up minutes after Izzy left the nursery. “I can’t remember what it was like, before I had to hold a baby all the time.” She looked down at little Alain in her arms as JJ polished off her wine glass. No, he couldn’t burden her with sex when getting his son not to scream all day took everything out of his beautiful bride. 

It was fine. JJ never stopped using his Grindr account, and the competitive season was coming up, filling his imagination with Yuri Plisetsky. 

“You’ve gotten kinkier since you got married.” Yuri’s shirt was tied around his wrists behind his back and he couldn’t move because JJ had him on his knees, face down on the Helsinki Hilton mattress, where JJ was pumping his fingers in and out of Yuri. 

He already came inside of Yuri. He just wanted to see and feel the soft, sick slick of his come dripping out of Yuri’s sweet, tight ass. “God, you’re so dirty, Daddy.”

“Say that again.”

Yuri looked over his shoulder and grinned like a cat who was getting all the cream. “You’re dirty, Daddy.” JJ’s dick got so hard and it felt so good when he plunged, balls deep, back into that ass. 

“So, having another baby? You like… you like being a father?” Yuri asked him later, as he laid in the sloppy wet sheets, pretending he wasn’t posing with his bare legs propped on the wall while JJ took pictures on his phone. 

JJ liked the subtle curve of his long, lean body. Yuri’s legs were smooth and the tone was perfection. JJ took shot after shot. “It’s great.” He didn’t want to talk about his son right now. He was with his mother and she was all he needed. JJ was there to pay bills, and make an appearance to cook occasional noodle dinners and give mommy a break. 

“She know about this?” Yuri looked at JJ through the phone screen. 

JJ shrugged. “What’s there to know?” That he couldn’t stop thinking about Yuri Plisetsky? That he imagined making love to him when he came inside his wife? That he called his Grindr dates kitten and always picked slim blondes to fuck in cheap hotel rooms? No, he can’t tell her what is going on between him and Yuri Plisetsky. He can barely admit it to himself. 

“Maybe you ought to let her know I’m fucking you.” Yuri sat up and gave a middle finger to the phone's camera lens. “Put that shit away.”

JJ took one more picture. “Why?”

The sun was coming up, and sherbet orange light was peeking through the blinds as Yuri flicked one open. “We both know why, stupid.”

++

JJ looks through a dark window. Something, he’s sure, has to happen. He’s got that grinding, jump-out-of-his-skin energy rolling under the surface as his last Percocet melts away in his gut. 

Yuri was supposed to call him, to show up at his door, dressed in white, rolling his eyes and grinning about he couldn’t wait to play nurse, slamming the door behind him. It was the worst thing that could’ve happened. And, God forgive him, JJ liked the idea. A lot. Too much. He imagined Yuri sponge bathing him and putting his hands all over JJ’s body. _Tell me where it hurts, Jeh Jeh_. 

But this hasn’t happened. Yuri is somewhere between JJ’s line of vision and Almaty. The dark window is more like a picture hung low on his wall, all blacks and blues and city lights. One day Montreal would belong to another Leroy. One day all the options would slam shut like so many doors slamming and JJ would be at the mercy of an unfathomable God with no options left, nothing left.

He has checked his phone so many times. He keeps checking Yuri’s Instagram. It’s got nothing but Yuri in ballet tights on his bed, from two days ago. They aren’t selfies. JJ always wonders who the photographer is, when he sees these kinds of posts. He’s sure Otabek is one of them. Maybe he took these, too. Yuri smiles through the screen. It seems like he’s about to move. To speak to JJ, to touch himself for JJ. But he’s not.

Yuri’s not _a lot_ of things. Most of all, not available at the moment. God, JJ would give anything to touch him. 

He wants to make something happen. To scream at the walls, like he did when he was sixteen and this close to being shipped back to Montreal like a defective product, until the walls changed into his bedroom walls and he could pretend he'd never even heard of Detroit. He wants to but he doesn’t want the police or the press or the shame of being back in his room, rooming with the brother who had already taken his place, right down to the bed. So he does something less disastrous. 

It’s still disastrous. 

JJ closes his eyes and he sees something blacker than the night outside his window. The kind of darkness where anything can come out. He knows he shouldn’t want to know what it is. But he has to know. The need to know is an itch under his skin, in his bones. 

“What, Jean?” Otabek picks up after two tries. 

The window is big enough to climb out of. For a second JJ imagines sitting on the ledge, and he would if he didn’t have this damn boot. “You in Russia?”

Something like wind blows on the other line. Otabek’s outside. “Yeah. What’s going on?” 

“A kitten in spandex is all it takes to forget all about Kazakhstan, Beks?” He’s two stories up. If he fell he’d really jack up his ankle. “You going to take his name, too? That’s what Nikiforov’s ex did.”

“Sounding bitter, Leroy.” Wind whipped the receiver. “Sounding real bitter.”

“He’s not going to stay with you.” JJ has to believe it. He has to believe he can call Yuri right now and say, _yes, come to Montreal and take care of me and stay with me_. And he has to believe Yuri would appear within hours, no baggage, no change of clothes, just himself, gasping as if he never stopped running after that phone call, breathless and falling into JJ’s arms.

“Ask him yourself. I don’t speak for others.”

And JJ will never do that. He will never call Yuri because he never does. Yuri is a perfect possibility, JJ’s Permanent Option. A fantasy he can visit, then put away when he walks in the real world. 

He’s so tired of the real world. So tired. 

“Nah. Let him know I’m happy for you guys. It’s touching, for sure.” He could make Yuri come, without a word, if he broke his ankle again. 

Otabek snorts. “Pretty desperate, right, Jean?” The phone call ends. The black and blue in JJ’s window goes on forever. He has no idea what will happen next. But it has to happen. 

++

Yuri came scratching on his hotel room last year in Tokyo, wearing the gold he took from JJ around his neck and a pair of Yuri’s Angels cat ears on his head. “I’m a bad, bad, kitty.” He held up the medal. He licked it. “Bet you wanna punish me for it.”

Oh, he did. 

Not because Yuri won gold. That gold medal JJ made him bite, while he yanked Yuri’s tracksuit pants down and bent that sweet, creamy ass over his knee, was Yuri’s, fair and square. No, it was because Yuri Plisetsky had been driving JJ crazy throughout the competition, ‘bumping’ into JJ with coy smiles, laughing and grinding in Mila Babicheva’s lap during practice, and dominating JJ’s focus with his intense performances. His Exhibition Skate was nearly JJ’s last straw. Yuri barely hid his near-naked body behind a giant feathered fan. He was no burlesque queen. No, he was a cat in heat and JJ had to fight everything inside of himself not to jerk Yuri into a corner and fuck into that glorious ass until Yuri begged forgiveness for showing himself like that to the world. 

“You _are_ a bad kitty!” JJ spanked him so hard and so much his palm was aching. And he didn’t care. “And you had to show everyone, didn’t you?”

“Was showing _you_ , Daddy!”

It was just part of the sex play. It wasn’t real. Yuri wasn’t his, he was just available. And that was the point. “Did you like it? Did you like making everyone want to fuck you?”

He looked so breakable. “Yeah.” 

JJ smacked one more time. “Luckily one of those people is me, kitten.”

He tied the medal’s sash around Yuri’s wrists, but it didn’t keep him from looping his arms around JJs neck when JJ finally pushed himself deep inside of Yuri. Didn’t keep him from threading his fingers in his hair as JJ slammed into his slippery tight heat again and again and again. He used that binding to pull JJ down as he came. To pull him down and devour JJ with his mouth as JJ lost himself inside of Yuri. 

God, he wanted to stay lost. 

Yuri said something in Russian. Something JJ didn’t want to know. Maybe he was talking about the snow outside. Maybe he said _I love you_. Maybe he was saying something rude about JJ’s latest tattoo - his daughter’s name, next to his son’s, over his shoulder. JJ wanted to imagine it could change, as if he could read different subtitles every time he remembered that moment. 

“Congratulations on the gold.” JJ didn’t bother covering their names up with a shirt. But he did crack open a bottle of sake. He poured out two cups and held one up. “Félicitation.” 

He and Yuri got very drunk that night. And when he finally fell asleep in JJ’s arms, holding him felt too good to be true. JJ pretended it was, when Yuri whispered, “I love you.” 

++

“You doing okay, Jay?” 

He drops his keys on the kitchen table. “My cleaning lady quit, my ankle is killing me, and I just spent all morning with the accountant. Your call just made it all better.”

“I’m pregnant.”

Four months along, if it’s his. He closes his eyes. “It isn’t mine, is it?”

“I’m sorry. I just found out.” She probably feels sick, like she did with the other ones. “We need to talk about annulment.”

He always thought this had to be the worst thing he could hear. JJ waits for his gut to twist. “Okay.” He keeps waiting. God help him, he feels nothing. His wife is closing the door on their marriage, on their family, and he’s numb. “Baby? Is this guy going to take care of you?” 

“He’s not in the picture.” 

Good. “Don’t worry about a thing.” His phone is buzzing but he can take the call later. He’s letting her go. It’s what she wanted all along. Ever since little Alain was born. 

What had he been doing to her?

“Jay?” she whispers into the receiver. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to force your hand.” No, she was right to do it. He sighs as he pulls a Molson out of the Frigidaire. “It just happened.”

He puts it back and takes a mineral water. “No, it’s okay, baby. It’s my fault.” It’s all his fault someone else’s seed is in her belly. But he can make it better. “The baby can have my name, if you want.”

She sobs on the other end of the line. JJ opts for the beer after all. “Oh, god. What happened to us?”

“I don’t know.”

He checks Yuri’s Instagram and there are more posts from St. Petersburg. More pictures of Otabek and Yuri. JJ finally feels something. It’s a break as hard as the one that took skating away from him. No, he never had those choices. He just pretended that he did. Then he sees it: Otabek and Yuri, holding hands in a car. There are two hashtags. The first: young love. 

JJ looks at the fire in Yuri’s eyes. The challenge in his sneer. Then he rereads the second: leaving for Almaty. 

No, they weren’t his choices. JJ puts down the beer. But choices were still on the table. He feels that itch under his skin telling him something has to happen. Something has to happen or he will break all the way through. 

++

He doesn’t know which apartment Yuri is staying in but he’s sure it’s on the fifth floor, and he’s pretty sure he’s going to walk every step if these elevator doors don’t open. He’s going to break his ankle all over again, break his neck if he has to, if that’s what it means to find Yuri Plisetsky. 

But he doesn’t have to. No, the elevator doors open and it is like God has delivered it, Himself, because it is blessedly empty and JJ can hobble in. 

He knows he might be too late. He knows they could be in Almaty right now. He knows he might be rushing just to find an empty apartment and he tells himself he will not pretend Yuri is waiting for him. He will not pretend that post was a challenge. He knows it is not. 

JJ is prepared to knock on every door. The first one produces an old woman with no English and a sweet smile who doesn’t know the name Yuri Plisetsky. The second gives him no answer. The third is a man with glasses who points down the hall and slams the door when he hears the name. 

He can hear Yuri rattling in Russian on the other side of the door 716. He wishes he could let himself in. He hasn’t slept in twenty-six hours and he’s buzzing off coffee and vodka and pure adrenaline and he needs to do something with this energy before it caves in on him. He knocks. “Yuri?” 

“Get lost!” No. Not yet. 

“Yuri!” He isn’t going to leave. He’s going to keep banging on this door until Yuri comes out and he has a chance to just look him in the eye and beg him not to go with Otabek. “I know you’re in there!”

“Go away, asshole!”

“Kitten!” JJ slams his hand against the door. He doesn’t care if people are coming out of their apartments and staring. He doesn’t care when the man with glasses takes out his phone. “Kitten, please come out!”

“I don’t want to!”

“You know I will knock this damn door down so you can either open it or move the fuck out of the way.”

He will kick it down with his boot if he has to. He kicks with his good foot. The dent is satisfying. He shoves with his elbow. The pain is good, like those vodka shots on the plane. “Yuri! I just need to tell you — you need to know — “

The door flies open and there he is, golden and angry and perfect. “Tell me what?!”

That he was right. JJ should’ve told Iz, years ago. That JJ was wrong, so wrong, not to let him come to Montreal. That he needed him in Montreal. That he needed him, everywhere. Because anywhere was nowhere without Yuri’s arms to keep him warm. But all he can say is, “I love you.”

Yuri blinks. His cheeks, his neck, his entire being all turn red and he steps back. “You are so— _fuck you!_ ” Yuri hits him. 

It’s a slap. And it’s hard. And it’s what he came here for. He came to offer himself to Yuri. To give Yuri the choice. And he knew, JJ knew, this was the best he would get. “I’m sorry.”

“Did you leave her?”

“We’re getting an annulment.” 

Yuri grabs his wrinkled flannel shirt. “Not what I asked you. Did you leave her?”

JJ flinches but he keeps eye contact. “She left me. I can’t -“ he knows this is where he breaks. His smile cracks his face and his heart slams against his ribs. “I just wanted to let you know before you left. You still have an option. A little worse for wear, not too shabby looking yet. Lots of money, even after alimony and child support kick in.”

Yuri looks inside his apartment. It is dark, the shades are drawn and the flatscreen is flickering. 

“Is he in there?”

Yuri frowns. Yuri looks down. “Otabek left this morning.” And he looks back up at JJ with that fire. “We broke up. I guess that means you think you can just sweep me off my feet now, right?”

JJ takes his hand. Kisses the knuckles softly. Touches his face gently. “You know that’s not really going to happen.”

Yuri smacks it away. His eyes are so bright and his cheeks are so wet. “Do you even know that I love you?”

JJ closes his eyes. “Please don’t.”

“I love you! Otabek was just a thing but it’s always been you!” Yuri grabs his face and forces his mouth on JJ’s as people stare. And JJ can’t help himself. He doesn’t care if they stare. This is the last kiss he will ever share with Yuri Plisetsky and he wants to make it last. 

He has to pretend, one last time. Pretend he’s not about to fall apart. Maybe he can make it as far as the elevator. JJ pulls back, cups Yuri’s cheek. Thumbs the tears away. “So, would you? Would you come away with me to Canada? Live with me? Be with me?” He knows the answer. He’s just going to pretend it would be something else. 

Yuri presses his face into JJ’s shirt and breathes in his scent. His hair is so soft, almost as soft as Yuri, himself. It already feels like a memory. JJ closes his eyes as Yuri speaks: “Finally.”


End file.
